#Amazon drivers are hanging smartphones in trees to beat competition

Enlarge Image

Mobile devices in a tree outside of a Whole Foods store in Evanston, Illinois.
Bloomberg via Getty Images

It’s a jungle out there for Amazon delivery drivers — who have started hanging smartphones in trees next to dispatch stations in the Chicago suburbs to get a leg-up on rivals.

As part of the ‘green’ new trend, which was also spotted at area Whole Foods, workers go out on a limb to take advantage of proximity-based software used by the firms to dole out delivery gigs, according to Bloomberg News.

“They’re gaming the system in a way that makes it harder for Amazon to figure it out,”  Chetan Sharma, a wireless industry expert, told the outlet. “They’re just a step ahead of Amazon’s algorithm and its developers.”

To get a spit-second jump the competition, the work-starved drivers sync their primary cellphones to a second one, dangle it from a branch and wait nearby, the outlet reported.

The low-hanging hack allows them to get assignments before other drivers who may as close as one block away from the company buildings, according to experts and people familiar with the situation.

The work-starved drivers are resorting to the extreme measures — in some cases to score $15 delivery routes — amid a coronavirus pandemic-ravaged U.S. economy that’s been hit by a more than 10 percent unemployment rate.

Drivers who aren’t hip to the move have taken to social media to try to dig up dirt on their competitors’ tactics.

Others have complained to Amazon that cheating competitors are rigging the system, prompting a vague response from the company.

The firm responded that it would investigate but wouldn’t be able to reveal the outcome to its drivers, according to internal emails obtained by Bloomberg.

The firm uses an Uber-like app dubbed Amazon Flex that lets drivers, who are paid per delivery, use their own cars and work their own hours. They must secure delivery routes via the app.

At Chicago-area Whole Foods stores where the branch-dangling gadgets were spotted, drivers compete for quick-delivery grocery orders. The so-called “Instant Offers” require an immediate response from nearby workers and take between 15 and 45 minutes to complete.

Amazon declined to comment and Whole Foods didn’t immediately return The Post’s request for comment Thursday.